Modern computers usually contain circuit boards, such as printed circuit boards (PCBs) on which a number of processors and accompanying peripheral components are mounted. A blade system includes an enclosure, with the enclosure containing a number of bays and each bay is capable of holding a printed circuit board that may be a blade. For example, some enclosures are capable of holding 20 blades. A rack that may be a server rack may contain a number of enclosures, with each enclosure containing a number of blades.
One type of server that employs an architecture similar to the one described above is an enclosure that includes server blades. A server blade includes a holder for holding a printed circuit board that has a generally rectangular dimension capable of fitting into a bay of a server blade enclosure. A server blade generally has a relatively thin width w that gives the server blade a razor-blade like appearance.
Each server blade includes a processor or processors and a number of components such as memory modules, disk drives, network interface controllers (NICs), heat sinks, and so forth. These components are placed on the PCB of the server blade in such a way so that they fit within the width of the server blade. Because of the narrow width of the server blade, many standard components that may be available from component suppliers may not be used. Also, due to the narrow width, the density of components (e.g., memory devices) or size of components (e.g., heat sinks) may have to be reduced.